€71 million in EU funds awarded to Italian mobility projects

Italy will be awarded with €71 million in EU funds through the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) to develop six projects that promote sustainable and innovative transport infrastructure, the European Commission (EC) announced on 1 October. With this initiative, the EC is proposing to invest 700 million € in 49 key transports projects that aim at improving the use of alternative fuels and electric cars, modernising Europe’s air traffic management and further developing waterbone and rail transport across Europe.

The selected Italian-based projects will be mostly targeted at the electrification of bus fleets and the upgrading of the railway network at the Port of Trieste. Companies such as Enel, Snam, Q8, Petrol and Port of Venezia will be the main beneficiaries of these grants aligned with the objectives outlined in the EU Clean Mobility package.

“These projects are concentrated on the strategic sections of Europe’s transport network to ensure the highest EU added-value and impact. This will allow us to further accelerate our transition to low-emission mobility across Europe, and firmly deliver on the EU’s agenda for jobs and growth. We expect it to unlock a total of EUR 2.4 billion of public and private co-financing,” EU Commissioner for Transport Violeta Bulc said.

The EC will adopt a formal decision on the investments following EU Member States approval of the proposal. The Commission’s Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (INEA) will then sign the grants with the project beneficiaries by the end of January 2019.

Italy: Leading the way on LNG vehicles

Registrations of alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs) in Italy reached a new record last year with 230.010 vehicles running on LNG, according to the 2017 Report by the European Automobile Manufactures’ Association (ACEA). With 24.1% of all of these type of vehicles sold across the European Union, Italy is leading the continental market. The Mediterranean country is also placed second on the European overall ranking of alternative fuel vehicles, with 11.6% of vehicles registered.

The big picture shows that in the fourth quarter of 2017, registrations of alternative fuel vehicles in the EU were 35,1% higher than in the same period last year. The ACEA annual report also indicates that alternative fuel vehicles in EU and EFTA reached a market share of 6,2% in 2017, that is 953.355 vehicles.